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Following Enrique's Journey North To The United States

A Central American youth rides a freight train through Mexico toward the United States. Each year, thousands of children cling to the tops and sides of trains as they journey north in search of a parent.
Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times
A Central American youth rides a freight train through Mexico toward the United States. Each year, thousands of children cling to the tops and sides of trains as they journey north in search of a parent.

When he was five years old, Enrique's mother left him for the United States.  Ten years later, he set off alone to find her -- a 1,500-mile journey north from Honduras, stowing away atop freight trains across Mexico.  Enrique's Journey was documented by Los Angeles Times photojournalist Don Bartletti.  The photographs won Bartletti a Pulitzer Prize in 2003, and they're on display through December at the New Mexico Humanities Council in Albuquerque.

"I want people to look in their eyes and say, Hey, this person is not very different than I am," says Bartletti.  "I'm not trying to make a statement about whether migration to the United States without documents is good or bad.  I'm trying to show the conditions from which people left, the circumstances it takes to find a better life, and whether it was successful or not."

In this longer version of the interview, Bartletti talks about his experience taking the photograph above.  "This little boy . . . was quivering uncontrollably, shaking, and sniffling.  And it crushed me, emotionally."  He also explains the scope of his coverage:  "I was following Enrique's journey from the grandparents who raised him in the absence of his mother, all the way til he found his mother two thousand miles away in North Carolina."

Following Enrique's Journey North To The United States

Copyright 2018 KUNM

Spencer Beckwith produces arts and culture pieces for KUNM.